For Industry Partners

Bring us a problem. Teams will compete to solve it.

Do Quantum is a free, nonprofit quantum research program with chapters at UCLA, UMD, and UVA. Name one or more problem areas that matter to your company. Teams spend a semester formulating quantum computing applications for them, and in December you choose one or more teams, and the projects you want to work on together.

Start a conversation How it works

Partnering is free. Prefer email? Write to contact@doquantum.org.

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Chapters at UCLA · University of Maryland · University of Virginia

Why Partner

See what quantum can do for you, and meet the people who found it.

You are not buying a report. Several teams work on your problem area for a semester, and you choose whichever are worth continuing with.

01

See the applications early

Early visibility into quantum computing applications in your problem area, each with a documented case for feasibility and expected benefits, from teams that want to work with you.

02

Competition gives you options

Because multiple teams compete on your problem area, you should have both applications and teams worth engaging with by the end of the program, not a single take-it-or-leave-it proposal.

03

A real hiring pipeline

Meet quantum talent that already understands the problems you are trying to solve, and watch them demonstrate aptitude, attitude, and commitment months before an offer, whether from the team you sponsor or the others that competed.

Problem Areas

What to bring us.

Our researchers work in two tracks, algorithms and architecture. You can name a single problem area or several, across either track. A good one is narrow enough for a team to scope in a semester, and real enough that an answer would matter to you.

Track 01

Algorithms

Designing, implementing, and benchmarking quantum algorithms, whether to probe what quantum computers will eventually make possible or to find advantage on problems that matter now.

Five stages. A team can work at any of them.

  1. 1
    AbstractUse the rules of quantum mechanics to find a task that quantum methods speed up.
  2. 2
    SimpleFind the simplest version of a problem that still shows a speedup. If it cannot be shown under ideal conditions, it will not appear in the real world.
  3. 3
    RealisticShow a meaningful speedup on a real problem, once the constraints of the problem and the hardware are accounted for.
  4. 4
    OptimizeGet it running on today's quantum hardware, and measure what that actually takes.
  5. 5
    DeployPut it into real, repeated operational use.
Track 02

Architecture

Using software to design and test larger, more accurate quantum hardware: modeling and simulating systems to explore future architectures or improve the fidelity and scale of the ones we have.

Three areas. A team can work in any of them.

  • Error correctionThe codes, decoders, and error mitigation that keep results trustworthy as machines grow.
  • Control systemsThe compilers and control stack that turn an algorithm into accurate operations on real hardware.
  • Quantum networkingLinking processors together so a system can grow beyond a single chip.

Most of the field's progress sits at the abstract stage. The later stages, where an algorithm meets a real problem and real hardware, are where progress is still needed, and where a problem from you is worth the most.

"Improve the performance of our open-source optimization toolkit, QOKit, for quantum portfolio optimization."

An illustration of the specificity that works well. Name the toolkit, the metric, and the outcome you care about, and teams can act on it.

How It Works

One academic year, from your problem to a working collaboration.

The partnership runs inside our existing training program, so nothing here asks you to build one.

  1. 01

    Before September: you name the problem

    You choose the problem area or areas you want teams to work on, and the terms you want us to tell them. This is the one thing we need from you before the year starts.

  2. 02

    September: we brief the researchers

    We tell every researcher that you want to collaborate with a team pursuing quantum computing applications in the problem areas you named, and on what terms.

  3. 03

    September to December: teams formulate applications

    Teams form around your problem areas, work out feasible and beneficial applications of quantum computing, and submit proposals.

  4. 04

    December: teams present at TRL 2

    Each team presents its proposal to Do Quantum at Technology Readiness Level 2: a documented application with an honest case for its feasibility and expected benefits.

  5. 05

    December: you select

    We send you the proposals, presentation recordings, and team profiles that met the bar in your problem areas, and, if you want it, our own evaluation of each team's feasibility and benefit case at no extra cost. You pick one or more teams, and the projects you want to work on.

  6. 06

    January onward: the collaboration begins

    Your team and project start work in one of two ways, whichever fits how you want to work.

What TRL 2 means.

Technology Readiness Level grades a proof of concept on one question: how close is this technology to reliable, operational use? Teams present to you at level 2, the honest stage for a semester of work, and the point where your input still shapes the outcome.

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Level 2: formulated feasible and beneficial application

The application is identified but still speculative: no experimental proof or detailed analysis yet supports it. Basic properties of algorithms, representations, and concepts are defined, and the team can code basic principles or experiment with synthetic data. Exit criteria: a documented description of the application addressing feasibility and expected benefits.

If you would rather teams reach level 3, where critical functions are validated rather than argued, we can set that bar with you before September.

Two ways to work together.

From January, pick the model that matches how much of your time you want to spend, and how soon you want people on site.

Model 01

The students join you

Students leave the program and intern or work with you, virtually or in person, through the second half of the academic year. Worth knowing up front: relocation in January cannot be guaranteed, since students are mid-year at their universities.

Virtual or in person Second half of the year
Model 02

You join the team

Students stay in the program and keep meeting in person, while one of your researchers joins their weekly one-hour advisor meeting online. This can transition into an internship or a work arrangement in the summer, when relocation is far more feasible.

One hour a week Summer transition possible

In either model, you can give the team resources that would help at any point, such as data or hardware access. That is optional.

The Researchers

People are not a piece of paper.

Almost nobody is hired on a resume alone. They are hired because someone watched them work and saw three things: that they can use your tools on your problems, that they fit the people already on your team, and that they will stay.

Level
Mostly undergraduates, with some graduate researchers, at UCLA, UMD, and UVA.
Usual majors
Computer science, physics, electrical and computer engineering, and mathematics. Every researcher starts with the same grounding in the mathematics behind quantum work, whatever they major in.
Team size
Small and focused, roughly four researchers per team, each built around a single well-defined research question.
Mentorship
Every team is matched with an advisor and meets with them weekly. Most advisors are PhD students, alongside faculty and other experienced researchers.

At the 2025 Global Industry Challenge, presented at Quantum World Congress, our students were runners-up in two of five industry challenges against 88 teams from 24 countries: MITRE's infrastructure track (molecular simulation) and the life-sciences track (computational biology). Participants have earned course credit for research practicum and moved into quantum computing internships.

Aptitude, attitude, commitment.

You would see each of these yourself, across the year, rather than take our word for any of them.

September to December

Aptitude

Teams that take on your problem area want your attention, so they learn your problems and your tools, then show what they can do with them. By December you are reading real work on something you care about, from every team that competed.

January onward

Attitude

Once you choose a team, you work beside them, either in their weekly advisor meeting or inside your company. Months of that tell you how someone takes feedback, admits they were wrong, and gets on with your researchers. No interview does that.

At an offer

Commitment

When you offer an internship or a role, taking it means choosing your company over staying in research. They chose your problem once already. The second choice is the one that tells you they will stay.

Every team, not only the one you choose.

Every team that took on your problem area spent a semester learning your tools because they wanted to impress you, and they present that work at our end-of-year symposium, to faculty, industry, and peers. The teams you do not select have still shown you their aptitude, and by choosing your problem at all, their potential commitment. You are not meeting one team. You are meeting everyone who wanted to work on what you care about.

FAQs

In case you're asking these questions.

We aim to be structured while staying flexible enough to find the best arrangement we can for you.

What does it cost?

Nothing. Partnering with Do Quantum is free, and it stays free whether you collaborate with one team or several. The program runs whether or not you are in it; your problem area simply gives teams something real to work on.

Who owns the IP?

IP terms are agreed with you before any work starts, and we make sure researchers follow the guidelines that preserve that ownership. Because the right answer differs for every partner, we scope it with you rather than impose a default.

How much of our time does this take?

Through the fall, effectively none: teams work inside our program. The commitment starts in January and depends on the model you choose, which can be as little as one hour a week for a researcher joining the team's advisor meeting.

What if none of the proposals are good enough?

Only teams that meet the bar in your problem areas reach you, and because several teams compete, you are choosing among options rather than accepting one. Selecting a team is your decision, in December, after you have seen the work.

When do we need to decide?

Before September, so researchers know your problem areas and terms as they form teams. If you are reading this later in the year, get in touch anyway and we will find the right entry point.

Mutual Benefit

What we get out of it.

We are an organization where every decision works backwards from what is in the best interest of the people who trust us to guide them.

  1. Anyone can start

    Interested

    Anyone interested can join, free. Interest is the biggest predictor of competence, demonstrating it is the only thing we ask for at the door, and consistent interest is what keeps them here.

  2. The academic year

    Competent

    Foundations, a track, a team, and an advisor take them from curious to genuinely competent. Your problem area helps them develop a competence that matters.

  3. Where you come in

    Compensated

    We cannot do this alone. The compensation follows, whether from you, from relationships between people we connected, or from other companies working on the same problems.

Which is why we want this to last years, not one semester.

Partnering is free · One or more problem areas · One academic year

Tell us the problem
worth solving.

Start a conversation Email contact@doquantum.org

Tell us what you are working on and we will follow up. Decisions are best made before September, when researchers form teams.